


spilling like an overflowing sink

by orphan_account



Category: Check Please! (Webcomic)
Genre: Character Study, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-08-29
Updated: 2015-08-29
Packaged: 2018-04-17 20:01:06
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,110
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4679510
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jack’s little thirteen year-old heart rattles in his chest. He presses his fingernails back into his thigh, and breathes in slowly through his nose</p>
            </blockquote>





	spilling like an overflowing sink

**Author's Note:**

> there is some casual drug use in this story (specifically marijuana, both underage and not), and one minor scene of minors gettin' it on in a basement, but it's not really graphic, and it's not really the point of anything other than discovery on jack's part. still, this is heads up for that.
> 
>  
> 
> title from halsey's 'colors.' all faults are my own.

Trent says, “She let me touch her tits from under her shirt,” without looking away from where his Crash Bandicoot is losing to Garret’s on the TV. Jack’s sitting on his hands and trying his best to focus on keeping his knee from bouncing.

 

“Fucking liar,” Pat says from his spot on the floor, and Jack holds his breath, but Pat doesn’t tack any insult onto the end of his accusation. Jack breathes out.

 

“You’re just jealous,” Trent says.

 

“You’re just trying to distract me, you bitch,” Garret says.

 

Michel says, “There’s no way she'd let you do that. She goes to church camp every year.”

 

“How’d’you know that?” Trent asks. His Bandicoot falls off the edge of the track. Garret’s going to lap him if he doesn’t focus. Jack digs his fingernails into the underside of his thigh. Pat leans back into Jack’s shin and looks up at Jack, passes Jack a can of rootbeer from the box at his side. Jack nods his thanks to Pat, and Pat smiles.

 

“She told me,” Michel says. “We’re friends.” Jack turns to look at him then, and he’s looking straight ahead, focused on the TV. He could be blushing, but the basement is dark.

 

“Oooooh,” Garret says. “Friends, huh?”

 

“Fuck off,” Michel says, and Pat laughs.

 

Jack thinks that Michel probably likes her. Dana’s nice. Jack’s only met her once, when she came to watch Michel play. She brought another kid from her and Michel’s street, and Michel had seemed nicer than Jack had ever seen him. Jack asks, “Do you like her?”

 

“Not if she let Trent touch her boobs,” Michel says, but it comes out raspy rather than mad.

 

Pat laughs, leans back into Jack’s shins again. “She definitely didn’t.”

 

“Yeah, you fuckin’ liar,” Jack says. He presses his shin forward into Pat’s back softly. Not hard, because he’s already sitting on the floor, and it’s probably not very comfortable. Pat chuckles, squeezes Jack’s calf so quickly that Jack almost misses it.

 

Jack’s little thirteen year-old heart rattles in his chest. He presses his fingernails back into his thigh, and breathes in slowly through his nose. He takes a sip of his rootbeer, then exhales.

 

“Our turn,” Pat says when Garret finally beats Trent. Pat leans back and reaches across Jack’s legs to take the controller from Trent. Garret hands the other to Jack.

 

Jack’s been trying to convince his mom to buy him a third and fourth controller, but they think that only having two will make him more social. He’s not really sure how that’s supposed to work, since less people can play at a time. But two is good, too. The basement’s big enough that they can be loud, and his mom lets them have food down there so long as Jack brings their garbage and dishes back upstairs.

 

Pat crashes into Jack’s Bandicoot twice before Jack realizes he’s doing it on purpose, at which point Jack abandons trying to win in favour of tackling Pat to the carpet. Pat’s more ticklish than anyone Jack’s ever met, and it’s easy to get him to tap at the carpet. “Tarbarnac,” Pat says, and Jack tries to ignore the huff of Pat’s breath across his cheek, knows he shouldn’t notice it. Knows he shouldn’t notice the feel of Pat’s thighs under his, either, and does his best to ignore that, too.

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  


Jack’s sixteen and only home for Thanksgiving. His mom calls down to him, tells him he has a call on the landline.

 

“When’s your family doing dinner?” Pat asks as soon as Jack answers.

 

“Not ‘til Monday,” Jack says. “Wanna do something? I don’t leave until Wednesday.”

 

“Sweet,” Pat says. “I can come over.”

 

“Sure,” Jack says.

  
  
  
  
  


Pat still smells like too much Axe and sweat and the spearmint toothpaste he’s always used, but he’s taller than when Jack last saw him in August, and it sits strangely in Jack’s stomach.

 

“I brought weed,” Pat whispers into Jack’s ear when they’re stomping down the stairs to the basement.

 

“You what,” Jack hisses, turning to tug at Pat’s sleeve to make sure they’re out of earshot.

 

“Relax, your mom told me they were going out when I called before. Told me to keep you company. She’s gonna give us money for pizza.”

 

“I can’t--” Jack starts. He’s working really hard on hockey, and pizza would be bad enough. His mom should know that. Drugs would be--

 

“It’s fun,” Pat says. “I promise you’ll like it. We don’t have to, but I thought if you were gonna, you’d wanna do it here, without other people.” Pat shrugs, like he really doesn’t care. “It was just a thought,” he says, and he seems suddenly insecure to Jack, which he’s not sure he’s ever seen before. Pat’s his best friend at home, even though they haven’t played on the same team in a few years.

 

Jack says, “Can we wait? Can I think about it?”

 

“Yeah, Zimmy,” Pat says. “Of course.”

  
  
  
  


They play GTA for over an hour before Jack’s dad comes down stairs. “We’re gonna go to the movies,” he says. “There’s money by the phone for pizza. But Jack, no extra cheese, okay?”

 

Jack groans, “Okay,” he says, huffing a bit. “Have fun,” he says.

 

“Thank you Mr. Z,” Pat says.

 

“Anytime, kiddo. It’s always good to have you over.”

  
  
  
  
  


Jack coughs hard, and his throat feels raw. “I don’t think I did it right,” he says. “Is it supposed to burn?”

 

“I mean, a bit,” Pat says. “It gets easier.” Pat inhales, and it seems like forever before he exhales again. He passes the joint to Jack, and Jack fumbles with it before pinching his fingers around the end, and holding it up to his lips. “Make sure you’re not swallowing the air,” Pat says.

 

Jack inhales again, and he watches Pat watch the joint at his mouth, watches Pat’s eyes snap up, holds Pat’s eyes until he exhales again, smoother this time. It still hurts his throat, burns. He clears his throat, and Pat’s eyes snap away.

  
  


Jack’s on his back, looking up at the basement ceiling. Pat stands, and Jack hears him open the window by the stairs. It’s too high for Jack to reach still, but Pat’s got a few inches on him still. He sits down by Jack’s hip, and Jack slaps his hand around until it connects with Pat’s thigh. “This is cool,” Jack says. His palms don’t feel clammy at all, and his eyelids don’t feel heavy, exactly, but they feel softer than normal. He lets his head roll from side to side. His lips feel fuzzy. He bites his bottom lip between his teeth, and the says, “I feel amazing.”

 

“Can we try something?” Pat asks. Jack leans up on his elbows to look at Pat, but Pat’s just tracing his finger along the pattern in the carpet beside Jack’s leg.

 

“Like what?” Jack asks. He thinks his heartbeat is speeding up, but it feels like an echo, like it’s not coming from inside his own body.

 

“I saw it in a movie,” Pat says, and Jack has no idea what that means. “It’s called shotgunning. I smoke from the joint and then exhale it for you to inhale.”

 

“Like into my mouth?” Jack asks, and Pat nods.

 

“It’s supposed to be sweet,” Pat says, and Jack nods back.

 

Pat scrambles a bit, relits the half-smoked joint they’d left on the coffee table. Jack props himself up higher, leans his hands back behind him to balance himself upright.

 

Pat takes a long inhale, and he holds his breath for a long string of seconds before leaning right into Jack’s space. He’s on his hands and knees, his hands flat on the ground by Jack’s hip, and Jack’s mouth falls open. Pat exhales slowly into Jack’s mouth, and Jack breathes as deeply as he can. His mouth feels dry. When Pat is done exhaling, he doesn’t move away. Jack holds his eye until he can’t hold his breath anymore, and he coughs a bit on the exhale, lets his eyes fall closed.

 

“How was that?” Pat asks, his voice rough, his breath tickling Jack’s face.

 

Jack nods, his head heavy, and his nose knocks Pat’s face. “Good,” he says. He clears his throat and says, “I--” but gets cut off when Pat smacks his mouth to Jack’s.

 

Jack groans. He’s never kissed anyone before, too scared and too quiet and too weird. Even when girls like him because he has famous parents, he’s never liked them back. His skin feels like it’s buzzing, and when Pat moves forward more, Jack lets his body fall back into the carpet.

 

He giggles as he falls back, and Pat doesn’t follow him. “No,” Jack says, shaking his head against the carpet. “No, I’m not laughing at you, c’mon, come down here.” He reaches blindly in front of him, opens and closes his fingers in a grabby-hands gesture until Pat’s weight collapses on Jack. Their teeth clack together, and it takes them a few times to figure it out, but then Jack doesn’t think he ever wants to stop, after that.

 

Jack likes kissing, he decides. He likes weed, too, he thinks. Even if he’s got to be serious about hockey, he thinks one time is okay. He’s happy he did it with Pat. He likes Pat. Pat’s a good friend. Pat’s a good kisser. He licks at Jack’s lip, and Jack’s hips jerk where he’s pinned to the carpet. He moans into Pat’s mouth, and lets his lips open to Pat’s tongue.

 

He touches Pat’s shoulders, runs his hand down his arms. Pat runs his mouth along Jack’s jaw, bites at his ear. It tickles, and Jack catches a laugh in his throat. It comes out as a gasp, his voice shaky and soft when he says, “tickles,” before thrusting his hips up into Pat’s.

 

When Pat bites hard at the tendon in Jack’s neck, Jack moans. “I’m going to come in my pants,” Jack says, and Pat groans into the sweaty skin of Jack’s neck.

 

“Do it,” Pat says, grinding down into Jack. “Shit, come on.” He sucks at the spot where Jack’s shoulder meets his neck at the collar of Jack’s t-shirt, and Jack’s toes curl as his orgasm hits. Ten minutes ago, he’d never even kissed someone else. Jack thinks he’d really like to do it again. Instead, he trails his hands down Pat’s side, snakes them to reach for Pat’s fly. Jack palms his hand over Pat a few times before he’s able to get Pat’s fly open, and then he just reaches his hand into Pat’s pants, wraps his fingers around Pat through his boxers. It only takes a minute before Pat comes too.

 

“Tabarnac,” Jack says, because he may be high, but he thinks that’d be the best thing he’s ever seen even if he weren’t. Pat breathes sticky into Jack’s neck, then rolls onto his back to lay beside Jack.

  
  
  
  
  
  
  


Kent is fast and he’s snarky, and he tells Jack to “shut the fuck up with the whistling already,” and Jack smiles at him through his mouthguard.

  
  
  
  
  
  


“Have you ever?” Kent asks.

 

“I smoked weed once,” Jack says. “With my neighbour Patrice.” He says it like he needs to prove it. “My mom gave me a beer last time I was home, with dinner. But.”

 

“Rum doesn’t taste like beer,” Kent says.

 

“I know that,” Jack says.

  
  
  


Rum, Jack finds out, taste spicy and warm. Kent’s mouth, though, tastes spicier, and it makes Jack hot all over. Kent bites at Jack’s hip like it’s nothing, like it isn’t a massive thing to Jack. Jack’s hands shake where they rest on Kent’s shoulder, and he knows that Kent thinks it’s just because he’s excited.

  
  
  
  
  
  


Jack’s skin isn’t blue when Kent finds him. Jack is breathing, but only barely. Jack doesn’t remember much. Kent gets into the ambulance with Jack and the paramedics, though, because even through the haze of it, he can hear Kent, hysterical, telling the EMT that Jack’s eyes are blue, not grey. “How come they look so grey?” Jack’s eyes fall closed eventually, although he doesn’t know when. He knows Kent is holding onto his hand, but he can’t feel it at all.

  
  
  
  
  


Shitty says, “What, you never done anything to piss off your dad?”

 

Jack’s sitting cross legged on his dorm-room-standard-extra-long-twin, and Shitty’s propped up against the pillows at the headboard.

 

Jack shrugs. “I’ve disappointed him plenty. Never wanted to make him mad on purpose.”

 

Shitty nods. “Well,” he says. “To each their own, I guess.”

 

They’re quiet for a few minutes, and then Shitty asks, “You wanna smoke?”

 

Jack’s quiet for a minute, then says, “I’ve only done it once before.” He’s not embarrassed, but it feels like admitting a defeat anyway.

 

Shitty shrugs. “I can show you the world, man.”

  
  
  
  


Jack asks, “Have you shotgunned before?”

 

Shitty squints at him before saying, “It’s like you think this is my first rodeo.”

 

“I’ve never been to a rodeo,” Jack says, and Shitty laughs.

 

“Alright,” he says, still laughing. “Okay.” He sits up on his shins, and Jack leans into his space as he inhales. When he exhales, Jack breathes in deeply, lets his eyes fall closed. Jack coughs once as he exhales. When he opens his eyes, Shitty is looking at him, his head cocked to the side. “You sure you never did anything to piss off your dad?” he asks, still in Jack’s space.

 

Jack’s been out to his parents for years. Just because Shitty doesn’t smell like spearmint and Axe doesn’t mean that Jack wouldn’t kiss him. Jack doesn’t think he really wants to, but still, the thought finds its way across his mind anyway.

 

Jack shakes his head. “I’m sure me being high in my dorm on the second day would piss him off if he knew,” Jack says, leaning back out of Shitty’s space.

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  


Jack’s drunk on a bottle of wine that he and Shitty are sharing, laying down in the yard of the Haus. Jack doesn’t know why he’s surprised to be back at Samwell. That was the plan when he enrolled. Finish his degree before pursuing hockey, if he still wanted to. To prove that he could be good at something else other than a game. That he's smart and capable and not crazy.

 

Jack’s heart is racing and there’s a lull in the conversation when Shitty runs out of things to say about the cute freshman art student he met that morning. Jack means to say something entirely different, but the last dreg of the chardonnay makes the words that come out of his mouth sound less like, “she seems cool,” and more like, “I’m gay.”

 

Shitty is quiet for a few moments, and Jack starts to actually panic before Shitty says, “Thank you for trusting me.” His voice is soft, and when Jack looks over at him, he’s still looking up at the sky. “I know--” he starts, stops. He lets out a slow breath and then says, “I know that must be a heavy weight to carry, prodigal son who fucked it and who lives in the closet. So. thank you. For trusting me.”

 

“Yeah,” Jack says, because he doesn’t know what else to say.

 

“I got your back,” Shitty says, and Jack knows he’s not lying.

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  


Bittle is small and fast and Jack instantly feels on edge.

 

Jack starts jerking off more than normal. He tries to focus on his studies. He’s shitty to Bittle, and then tries to fix it. It takes a while.

  
  
  
  
  
  
  


Kent shows up, just when Jack was trying to find his nerve to lean into Bittle’s space, to push their bodies close, close, closer. Kent says, “Didja miss me?” like Jack’s existence hasn’t been tied up in him since the day they met.

 

Later, Jack smacks his head back against his door as hard as he can stand. It hurts, but it’s something he can control. It hurts, but it doesn’t feel bad, doesn’t feel rotten, doesn’t feel like it poisons everything else that belongs inside Jack.

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  


He finds cookies tucked into his bag, and his heart swells in his chest.

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  


When Jack kisses Bittle, it’s soft. It barely happens. It’s gentle, and if Jack hadn’t initiated it, he wouldn’t be sure that it was happening. Bittle’s breath smells like coffee and toothpaste. Jack presses his lips to Bittle softly, lets his hand cup Bittle’s chin just for a second before falling away. Bittle huffs, says, “Ja--” before leaning forward to smack into Jack’s mouth. Their noses knock, and Jack exhales through his mouth. Jack can feel Bittle’s eyelashes on his cheek. Jack shivers, his skin and nerves not cooperating, but he doesn’t feel scared at all.

 

Jack presses Bittle back into the kitchen counter, hoists Bittle up onto it. Their mouthes don’t separate for long unless it’s to kiss at skin. Jack nips softly at the underside of Bittle’s jaw, and Bittle’s hands drag across Jack’s shoulders.

 

“Hmm,” Jack hums when Bittle sucks at the sensitive spot under his ear. “Feels good,” he says.

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  


The first time Bittle presses into Jack’s body, Jack shakes and shakes. He feels safe and warm and good the entire time. Bittle kisses him the whole time. Jack has to thrust down onto Bittle to get him to move harder, faster. Jack’s mouth falls open, and they breathe into each other’s mouthes. Jack doesn’t feel like he’ll ever get close enough to Bittle.

 

Jack comes first, and Bittle mumbles into Jack’s skin. He touches Jack’s cheeks reverently, says Jack’s name like it’s caught in a prayer, and Jack presses his fingers into Bittle’s upper arm.

 

“C’mon,” he says, and Bittle moans. “I got you,” Jack says.

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  


When they unpack the last of Bittle’s boxes into their condo, they line up their shoes on the closet floor, hang their shirts on either side of the closet. Their toothbrushes sit side by side in the bathroom, a significant middle ground at the double vanity. Jack’s hand shakes when he runs his fingers gently down Bittle’s side when they’re in bed, but they rarely shake when he does anything else. He breathes into Bittle's mouth, inhales air from Bittle’s sour-breathed kisses in the morning, and he doesn’t hesitate to press his front along Bittle’s back, doesn’t hesitate to let the warmth of the late morning pull him back into sleep.

  
  
Jack lets himself notice all of it, the happy and easy space of their kitchen, their bathroom, the sticky-sweet space between their bodies when their flushed skin is pressed together. He breathes in deeply, savours it. 

**Author's Note:**

> i just can't stop thinking how when you're young, things feel so massive and impossible, and how the older you get, the sadder happiness makes you, how it sneaks into the cracks of your ordinary, stressful life, and it lights everything up. i wrote this because i was walking my dog tonight, and the sunset was so beautiful, and i couldn't believe the absurdity of life. i hope jack gets to see so many beautiful sunsets, that he gets to hold bittle's hand while the sky turns from blue to orange to pink to black


End file.
